Episode 427 - Onions Have Layers

00:00:00[intro theme playing]

Welcome

00:00:22Tony O'Connell: And welcome to episode 427 of the parkrun adventurers podcast, a podcast about life, if your life is all about parkrun. My name is TOC and I'm coming to you from Bunurong Country.

00:00:34Melissa Ellis: And my name is Melissa Ellis coming to you from Wurundjeri Country. Hi Toc, we're waiting patiently. I've created all the suspense for your big announcement about your injury.

00:00:49Tony O'Connell: Oh, I thought you meant the other big announcement, Mel. I was just about to reveal all. Lucky we're pulled back from that. Let's pull back. Let's pull back. No, my surgeon gave me some really great news. I've got a longish rehab ahead of me, but he's not going to operate. And he thinks it'll heal itself. And he's given me a program. So good news. I'm out and about still. And yeah, getting around on four legs at the moment. So I've got my crutches going everywhere with me. I set a crutch PB on the weekend at parkrun. One that I hope not to have to repeat too many more times. But yeah, it was really positive news at the surgery. And the fact that I don't have to have surgery was probably the best news out.

00:01:37Melissa Ellis: Did anybody ask you about your amputation?

00:01:41Unidentified speaker: No.

00:01:43Tony O'Connell: No, but funny you should say that. I saw a picture on parkrun Australia's socials on the weekend about a fella from Warragul that gets around with one leg and crutches.

00:01:52[crosstalk]

00:01:53Melissa Ellis: Oh, we know it wouldn't have stopped you. I was just trying to build suspense so people would listen again this week. That's all it was. I was being a bit cheeky saying that you were having an amputation. I shouldn't joke. It's not a laughing matter and it's, you know, I'm sorry.

00:02:09Tony O'Connell: Please forgive me. That's all right, Mel. The leg that I left back in the surgery forgives you as well. No. All good. We're back on track. It'll be a couple of months before I can run, but... Yeah, I'll take that over the initial diagnosis that was saying I probably wouldn't run till early next year sometime. I'll take a couple of months quite happily.

00:02:32Melissa Ellis: Good. Listen to your doctors. All righty. But what have we got to recap, Tony, from last week?

00:02:40Tony O'Connell: Mel, a couple of things. I was listening in to you and Simon, and you were talking about Run the World. Run the World's an awesome app, and I love it. It's probably my favourite all-time app. It'd be fair to say I look at Run the World more often than I look at Strava or Garmin even. For a runner, that's like sacrilege admitting that. But I absolutely love the app. I love the map. I love the fact that when I hit a new town, every 100km or so, I get a little email that tells me about a town I... Now I get a little notification, I open it up to read it because I'm really excited to read about towns and their running festivals and the history of the town and that. You and Simon spoke about a couple of the maps, but the ones that weren't mentioned were run down under two where you run a different course around Australia and you go to different spots that aren't on the original map. So that's another 15,000 kilometre map. East Asia, that's the one that I'm currently on, and I've only got about 250km to go, and by my original reckoning I was going to finish that two weeks ago, so I'm hoping to finish that in about six or seven weeks. Canada, and this is the longest one. The longest walk actually runs from South Africa from the southern tip all the way up to the top of Russia, and it's a 22,900km event, which is awesome. Run the World is great for motivation. I just encourage people to jump onto it, have a look at it. And if you do jump onto it, use one of us as a referral and put down your running club as parkrun adventurers because Travis does get behind quite a few running clubs and he considers us to be a running club and he helps us out. And it does help us put the pod DML.

00:04:22Melissa Ellis: Now, the letter that we also read out from Travis last week says, That was what we were trying to convey. But that was a little bit different to just listing your club, wasn't it? That was a referral system.

00:04:35Tony O'Connell: Yeah, so there's also a referral system at the moment. Travis is trying to grow the membership at the moment. And so if you put down a referral for someone, say you sign up for Run the World and you say, where'd you hear about it? You put down TOC. I get a little bit of a discount, you get a bit of a discount, everyone's happy. So there's a referral system, but then there's also these club points. And Travis awards not only an amount of money per member once you get to a certain size. So you can't just have a club of three people and get a... a payback uh you've got to have a minimum number but Travis also gives you a bonus for new members that have come on board so for someone like the adventurous podcast it's really great because that money is going to help us you know we hire our gear at our palms we pay for pod Bean and our other pod hosting expenses it's just a great little kick on both ways

00:05:28Melissa Ellis: Okay, so I think I was getting really confused and maybe I thought that when you put who referred you, you could put the parkrun adventurers who referred you. But you actually have to put a person through.

00:05:42Tony O'Connell: That's something that we probably should ask Travis about. I've never actually asked because that would be another handy way of generating some extra revenue as well for the adventurers. I might run that past Travis.

00:05:54Melissa Ellis: Out of the pod hosts, I think you're the only one that might be doing Run the World.

00:05:59Tony O'Connell: I think so. So don't try and look up me.

00:06:01[crosstalk]

00:06:02Melissa Ellis: I'm actually there. I'm stuck in WA because I haven't been active for a long time.

00:06:09Tony O'Connell: I'm a little bit of a, I don't know, a groupie for Run the World. Mel, I've done five. No. Yeah, a little bit. I've done five maps now, and the last time I had a look, I think out of all the people in Run the World, and he's got the thousands, I think I was eighth on the number of kilometres on the map. So, yeah.

00:06:32Melissa Ellis: This is why you have a stress fracture. You know that, right? Yeah.

00:06:36Tony O'Connell: No, no, it's from sitting down too much, I'm sure. I'm sure you get stress fractures from not doing anything.

00:06:43Melissa Ellis: Don't think it's in your ass, Tony.

00:06:48Ben Clancy - Run Director, Gungahlin parkrun: Well, I wouldn't be sitting down if it was, would I?

00:06:52Tony O'Connell: Let's try to put a boot on that.

00:06:58Melissa Ellis: We also had some feedback from Heather Hunter. She popped onto the published pod post from last week and she said, confirming Taree parkrun has got path damage and hasn't restarted yet with a sad face emoji. She also said, assuming that... isn't answered later in the episode no it isn't going to be because we didn't find that out any other way and as far as she knows there is no confirmed restart date yet so sad for Taree and we hope that they can get their course up and running again soon. TOC, are you aware of any other courses that are in the same situation I'm sure there is some.

00:07:36Tony O'Connell: I'm not aware of them, Mel, but I know there are a few events that have had longer-term damage. You look at locally, we've got Werribee Mansion in Victoria that had the bridge washed away as part of the course, and that became a long-term course cancellation, which the bridge is actually being repaired at the moment, which is interesting.

00:07:57Melissa Ellis: Do you have any inside information for the very interested listeners? Because I believe parkrun removed that from the website.

00:08:06Tony O'Connell: No, I don't, Mel, other than I've seen the... The post from Parks Victoria saying that it's currently being reinstated and they showed pictures of workmen there. A quick look at the cancellations page on the Australian website, which sort of gives you a bit of an idea of if any are out for long term. There's Risdon Brook for some reason are unavailable for the next three weeks, so possibly a little bit of damage there from rains.

00:08:37Melissa Ellis: That's in Tasmania. Yeah.

00:08:39Tony O'Connell: That's in Hobart. Yes, that's the old Hobart parkway. The terrace is out. And Whitfords Nodes, course unsafe or blocked. Yeah, there's only the couple there that are listed as a long term.

00:08:55Melissa Ellis: Okay, so it would appear that from those bad floods, Taree might be the only one that sustained a permanent or damage that meant that they couldn't keep proceeding until it was rectified. Correct.

00:09:09Tony O'Connell: And that's the ones for the next three weeks, Mel. There's, of course, the events that, and Taree could be in that boat where they're hoping they might be able to go next week so they're not going to cancel it this early in the week and they might cancel later in the week. So, as we always say, the cancellations page is always something you need to have a look at if you're travelling. But, you know, they might be just hoping each week that they can get it closer and not cancelling too far in advance in case it's up and going because once you cancel an event, you can't uncancel an event.

00:09:40Melissa Ellis: All right. Well, why don't you tell us how you hopped around or where you hopped around on last Saturday, TOC? I'm dying to know all about it.

00:09:50Tony O'Connell: That's a pretty funny analogy, Mel, because there were kangaroos everywhere hopping around where I went on Saturday. So that ties in quite well. On Saturday, Thursday at lunchtime, we had no idea where we were heading and it was looking like being back to Inverloch. Thursday night, Jack suggested, why don't we go for another drive? We can't do much with your leg anyway, so you can sit the car. So we had a quick road trip up the Princess Highway. It was only six and a half hours each way. Nothing. So it's almost in our backyard. And that was our Nendi, our mainland Nendi. We, of course, have nine events closer in Tasmania, but I'm not much into swimming and the 150k swim over Bass Straits just beyond my capabilities at the moment. So we wandered up to Panboola Wetlands in the traditional lands of the Yunnan Minaro people. It's in the town of Pambula and it's at the Panboola Wetlands. There are 102 finishes on the day. We had beautiful still air. We had blue skies. The forecast for Victoria was for rain, hail and all sorts of corruption. And that was part of the reason we decided to drive because we didn't want to hang around and get too wet. But it's beautiful. It's absolutely glorious up there. They had 102 finishes, which was boosted by a local jazz festival at Merimbula, which is only just up the road. And that was actually the scene of my first ever parkrun. That's what got me into it. How I left Merimbula parkrun after going to Park Vaf after it as a first timer, thinking, I want to set one up at Inverloch. It had that big an effect on me in Merimbula. The course itself, I think we've heard about it before, it's a loop around an old horse race track which is now converted wetlands and you are greeted by dozens of kangaroos. They jump across the track, they run beside the track, some of them just sit up and look at you and wonder what the hell you're doing running around their track. The event team, super friendly. We went back into the cafe. We had to be out of the motel by 10 o'clock. So we thought plenty of time, breakfast, jumped in. About half past 10, we thought we better get going because we've still got to have a shower, pack up and get out of the motel by 10 o'clock, which we were a bit late. Motel were really cool with it because they're only a couple of hundred metres from parkrun and obviously they know parkrunners regularly want to go and have breakfast and have a chat. Now, that was my weekend. Great little weekend. Up and back pretty quick. How about you? Where did you get to?

00:12:30Melissa Ellis: Well, I just stayed local. Not much to tell. I returned to Toolern Creek. I think I'm on 25 or 26 visits now. Um, staying close to home, as I did indicate I would do last week in last week's episode, 72 participants braved the cooler conditions. It wasn't really very nice, even out our way, but it stayed dry. It was just cold. So, um, in my true form, I decided it would be wise to run in long pants and long sleeves with my tracksuit top and a puffer vest and a beanie. I'm a real wimp when it comes to stripping down to go for a run. I don't like being cold. So I'll often, look, often I will run in my puffer vest. It's not a huge thing. But as I was probably approaching the 4K mark, I really was getting hot. So as I was running along, and because this is a pretty regular occurrence with me where I overheat, I'm quite good at peeling off the layers as I run. So I peeled off the puffer, looped it over my wrist, peeled off the tracky top, tied it around my waist, put the puffer back on. I did all that as I was running. Anyway, all good. I get to the finish line, scan my token, catch up with Dave, and then we're about to walk off and this guy is waving at me and he's like, was that you that got undressed as you were running? LAUGHTER He's like, I was running behind you and I couldn't believe it. And I was like, oh, yes, I do that all the time. That was a bit odd. I can honestly say that I've never been asked that before.

00:14:18Tony O'Connell: So the numbers will be up next week at Toolern Creek.

00:14:21Melissa Ellis: I really need to rethink my life choices. Goodness me. But I don't, like, to be fair, I usually have my adventurous top or something under my... tracky top but I'd worn a long sleeve under the yeah so I just I got so hot anyway oh hopeless Mel was like an onion she had layers yeah anyway so we we and then we went off to urban 35 for brunch because Dave hadn't been there before so I'm still showing him around the local area a little bit We had a lovely lunch, but we sat down in the cafe next to a couple that were also sitting down to enjoy their lunch in their active wear. Turns out they had just rent Aintree parkrun and they were very keen to talk parkrun. So that was lovely. We had a little chat with the couple next to us at the next table, all about parkrun tourism. But that's my Saturday. So not much else to tell.

00:14:39[crosstalk]

00:15:19Tony O'Connell: Some of those nice and relaxing Saturdays can be the best ones, Mel. And you're only 75-odd now off your single tonne at Toolern Creek. That's going to come about really quick.

00:15:30Melissa Ellis: Yeah. Knowing my luck, I'll get to 70 or something, which is what I got to when I was at Berwick Springs, and then I'll move again. I'll never get a tonne anywhere. Anyway. I think he should be able to have an accumulative home parkrun score.

00:15:45Tony O'Connell: Yeah, we've got people like Ryan that moves every week and it'd just happen all his parkruns would be on his score then.

00:15:53Melissa Ellis: Yeah, that's true. Does he change his home parkrun every week?

00:15:56Tony O'Connell: No, but he moves parkrun every week.

00:15:58Melissa Ellis: Yeah, no fixed address.

00:16:03Tony O'Connell: Our wandering parkrunner.

parkrun news bulletin

00:16:05Tony O'Connell: Well, we're talking about getting some big stats up. Let's talk about New Zealand. Across the ditch on the 7th of June, our Kiwi correspondent reports that there was a cold snap with snow at Hanmer Forest parkrun and several running events that may have been part of the reason that the number of finishes dropped, by 2,463 down to 7,235. That's a fairly big drop. That's about 25% of the New Zealand parkrunning population dropped in one week. Volunteer numbers were also down. They were down to 898. The largest parkrun in New Zealand was, of course, Hagley. That seems to be our regular on the North Island area. Menengro River Waikato was the smallest with 10 people okay and just to be clear Hagley was the South Island and the smallest was on the North Island correct okay excellent so lots of snow yeah apparently it's very cold lots of rain like widespread across the bottom of Victoria as well yeah

00:17:13Melissa Ellis: Alrighty, but meanwhile in Australia, across 504 events, we had 61,700 odd finishers who were supported by 6,100 and a few volunteers to complete 8,800 and a few more PBs. One attendance record was broken at Horseshoe Bay Reserve, located in South West Rocks. This record has stood for exactly one year and went from 170 to 178 finishes. Horseshoe Bay had a running festival on the weekend. But looking at the photos on Facebook, it is a stunning parkrun. Not one I know much about.

00:17:50Tony O'Connell: Mel, I didn't know much about Horseshoe Bay either. And I had a bit of a deep dive into their pictures. And look, it's got beach, it's got trees, it's got... Actually, it's a really good looking parkrun to go to. And it's actually, it's gone onto my list.

00:18:04Melissa Ellis: But where's Southwest Rocks? Because this does not tell me geographically where this event is.

00:18:09Tony O'Connell: So Southwest Rocks is sort of mid to northern New South Wales coast.

00:18:13Melissa Ellis: Okay.

00:18:14Tony O'Connell: Yeah, so probably up Coffs Harbour, up towards that way.

00:18:19Melissa Ellis: Okay, and we've also got a little note from the office staff, Mobilong, is that how that's pronounced? That's it. Yeah, the prison parkrun was the smallest in... Australia with four parkrunners. Puckapunyal was second smallest with five. And what else have we got? We got some other small numbers. Port Broughton, Nathalia Showgrounds, Waterloo Plains, they all had six. So that just is an indication of the cold weather keeping people...

00:18:47Tony O'Connell: in their warm beds but this largest in Australia was at South Bank Queensland was 702. yeah lots of big numbers around some events in Australia but lots of them were well down because of the cold and the rain I know in block I heard that the rain started just as they're about to finish so Yeah, they just snuck through, but I know there's quite a few events that reported it was raining all day and so attendances were down a fair bit.

00:19:14Melissa Ellis: I bet you were feeling smug up there in your warm Panboola Wetlands.

00:19:19Tony O'Connell: Well, we just cruised around in a T-shirt and shorts and really enjoyed it.

00:19:26Melissa Ellis: Now, there is a special day happening as we speak, TOC. Tell us all about that.

00:19:32Tony O'Connell: It's Wit Monday in the Netherlands, Mel. As we speak, there's quite a few people running around. We're recording on the Monday night. And in Netherlands time, it's about 10 o'clock at the moment. So they're probably... Still out running around, some will be still running around, some will be finished. Wit Monday is a holiday celebrated the day after Pentecost. It's a movable celebration because it's determined by Easter and the origin of the name is attributed to the white garments formerly worn by those newly baptised on this feast. Well, there was lots going on over there. I've seen so much social media because we did the Wit Monday extra event a couple of years ago, and I'm still in a couple of groups from that. Major train strikes over there. The Netherlands, primarily, if you don't catch a train, you ride a bike. They don't have a lot of buses. They don't have a lot of cars. And there was a train strike on Friday, which as everyone's trying to come in to get their Saturday and their Monday parkruns, they couldn't get out of airports. There was a train strike today, I believe, and there's another one tomorrow, all in different areas. So there's just a bit of chaos over in the Netherlands at the moment for the parkrunners. But I'm also seeing lots of pictures of happy, smiling parkrunners, even though they are drenched. Saturday, they copped a massive amount of rain over there.

00:20:52Melissa Ellis: And we do know that some of our adventurers are at events over there. I believe Barb Luther with, I don't know if she's with Renata Koch, but I do know that Barb Luther is at Beatrixpark parkrun. I think there's a very well-known UK unofficial parkrun podcast host there at this very same event. Now, also, I believe Barb bumped into a Tooting Common adventurer, in the way of Imogen Swales. So we might be hearing a little bit when we next record about how those people enjoyed their parkrun morning. Yes.

00:21:30Tony O'Connell: And Mel, I think we also have an update a bit closer to home. We have a budgie update.

00:21:36Melissa Ellis: We do. Budgie has finally made it to the Northern Territory and completed a visit to every state and territory in Australia. Possibly even very coincidentally, he joined the Peel Club this week. So Sarah Jefferson popped into Dazza's, but we're going to read it here because it relates to Budgie. Hey, Dazza, a great morning pounding the pavement at Katherine Hot Springs parkrun. Super friendly crew, lots of tourists and a lovely brekkie after the hot springs. A day out exploring Katherine Gorge for the win. This area should be on everybody's bucket list, I say. Wait, is that budgie I can see? Hashtag spotto. And other fellow adventurers? Crazy the people you see. And Sarah used a butterfly emoji. And she shared a photo of herself in the selfie frame with Budgie and adventurer Jodie Maisie. Now, this is exciting news that Budgie has completed his lap of Australia and he's... Oh, he would be in the Oberg Club too because I think he also went to both islands. If he even had a barcode. But of course he doesn't because that's against the rules, inanimate object objects and animals are not allowed to have barcodes so anyway he is going to be making his way back to myself or you, TOC whichever who doesn't matter and he is going to get put up in his hangar so we are retiring budgie yep time for budgie to have a long overdue maintenance schedule I think he's going to bed all right oh and just jumping back to Whit Monday, TOC I just wanted to give a bit of a shout out I believe the tame volunteer is doing a milestone well would that be today or was that on Saturday that would be today the tame volunteer or Harriet as we like to call her was doing her v500 today which is an amazing thing Harriet

00:23:34Tony O'Connell: or the tame volunteer volunteers at so many more parkruns than she's ever run she doesn't run at parkruns all that often so we've got a roving report coming in we believe so that'll be interesting as well but we know our friend Pippa was in she goes to Le Mans every year she's very keen on that she was actually going to make the road trip up to the Netherlands and make a special trip up through there to be there when Harriet did her 500th so congrats Harriet Really well done.

00:24:04Melissa Ellis: Excellent. I look forward to hearing the audio when we receive it.

Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew

00:24:07Melissa Ellis: But now we've got some audio from some other people. So let's go and have a listen to that.

00:24:10[background music]

Roving report Sarah Jefferson — Katherine Hot Springs parkrun

00:24:21Sarah Jefferson: Good morning, parkrun adventurers. It's Sarah here on the West Side, but I'm not on the West Side. I have gone slightly east and north, and I'm up in Katherine, checking out Katherine Hot Springs parkrun this morning for their event number 81. And I'm here with this morning's Run Director, Salty. Good morning, Salty.

00:24:38Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: Good morning, Sarah. How are you?

00:24:39Sarah Jefferson: Well, thank you. Great morning this morning.

00:24:41Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: Yeah, beautiful weather. Nice and cool. Nice. Something a bit different.

00:24:45Sarah Jefferson: Definitely. Pleased that it's the dry season, that's for sure. Can I please get you to describe the parkrun course for the listeners?

00:24:53Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: Yeah, so we've got a nice easy course here. It's an out and back, pretty flat, runs along the picturesque river, Katherine River here. So there's a couple of buildings along the way. We've got O'Keeffe House and Hunter House, which are two, I think, of the only World War II buildings in the region, in Katherine, and one actually runs as a garden centre. which is really nice so people can get along there and get some plants. And then as you flow on up from that, we get up towards the Katherine Bridge, which is an iconic bridge here in Katherine. It's one of the original rail bridges that came through here well before World War II and is the longest spanning bridge on the Australian Railway.

00:25:00[background music]

00:25:39Sarah Jefferson: Still in very good condition actually.

00:25:40[crosstalk]

00:25:40Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: It is, it is in very good condition. And it's really good actually that we're able to use that and get across and that's pretty much at the turnaround point. So once you've run across the bridge, you turn around and then come straight back and along the path. And finished right above Katherine Hot Springs, which I guess is another iconic location so people can go for a swim afterwards.

00:26:00[background music]

00:26:00Sarah Jefferson: Yes, so I saw obviously the name Katherine Hot Springs, but it's literally at the Hot Springs. It's super exciting.

00:26:05Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: It is literally at the Hot Springs. We're right at the entry there. So pretty much when people are done, they can walk straight down and jump into the Hot Springs.

00:26:13Sarah Jefferson: Amazing. And there's a great cafe set up here.

00:26:17Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: Yeah, we're quite lucky. So during the dry season from about April to October, Pop Rocket Cafe opens up. So it is a pop-up cafe in a couple of well-fit-out shipping containers, which they take away during the wet. So when the wet hits, we have an alternative. We go into the Black Russian, which is just near the shopping centre there.

00:26:38Sarah Jefferson: Yep. And there's a huge queue. It's very busy down here.

00:26:41Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: It is very busy. As Run Directors, you often have to stand at the back of 20 or 30 people. Crazy. Yeah.

00:26:49Sarah Jefferson: Should be a pass through to the front or something.

00:26:52Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: It should be.

00:26:53Sarah Jefferson: It was great to see so many volunteers on course this morning. You were mentioning, I think, the volunteers get a coffee funded by...

00:27:00Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: Yeah, so Jo Hersey is Country Liberal Party. She's the member for Katherine in the Northern Territory Government, and she's a local here. She's been here many, many years, and she supports the parkrun. She volunteers at the parkrun. She runs the parkrun when she's here. Obviously, she has a busy schedule as a member, but, yeah, she's been donating coffees for as long as I can remember, so probably at least since it started for the year and a half, which is really good.

00:27:29Sarah Jefferson: And obviously 81 events in, how's it been going? How was the setup of the course?

00:27:30[background music]

00:27:34Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: Yeah, so 81 events in is pretty good. We get about 60 to 100 people here generally. The course has actually been running for about four or five years. A bunch of RAAF physical training instructors were here and started a (not)parkrun on the same course and over a few years they obviously went through the process, did what they needed to do through parkrun Australia to get it recognised. And the first session or the first parkrun was mid-November, 2023. Didn't run that Christmas, just the number of volunteers needed to get events over the Christmas period when people go away. But it's run consistently since early January then in 24 and we haven't missed a parkrun since. So we even managed to do a Christmas and a New Year's as the additional ones this last Christmas, which was fantastic.

00:28:20[background music]

00:28:26Sarah Jefferson: Yeah, amazing. And you've been getting some pretty good numbers, you were saying, Evan, during the wet season?

00:28:31Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: Yeah, so earlier this year we actually had four weeks in a row where we got a little over 100 people during the wet season, which is a bit crazy because people tend to not come up here during the wet season. Yeah, and hopefully as the dry really kicks in, we'll start to see more people. But I guess as I was saying earlier, a lot of the Air Force community goes away during the long weekends and the holidays, and then we have the tourists come in. So our numbers kind of stayed relatively stable.

00:28:50[background music]

00:28:59Sarah Jefferson: Obviously, the water here is a little bit warmer, but there is still a sign for crocodiles, I have to ask. Are there ever crocodiles in the Katherine Hot Springs?

00:29:07Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: There was a report of a saltwater crocodile about two months ago. Oh, wow. All the locals don't believe that it was a salty. It was either a lizard or a freshwater in here. But the council still had to do the right thing and shut it down and do some checking. But no saltwater crocodile was found.

00:29:18[crosstalk]

00:29:26Sarah Jefferson: Awesome. And just quickly, a few little points of note around the area that if people, I guess, are touristing out to Katherine, that they should definitely check out.

00:29:36Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: Oh, around Katherine, look, there's too many. Definitely the Katherine Hot Springs and come on a Saturday so you can do the parkrun. But probably the best is Nitmiluk Gorge. Get out to the Katherine Gorge. There's a couple of boat tours you can do out there. You've got Edith Falls, which is about an hour north. You have Mataranka and a bit of springs down towards the south, about an hour south. Cutta Cutta Caves. And if you're here for a longer time, something like the Jatbula Trail, which goes from Nitmiluk Gorge out to Edith Falls, is a five-day hike. If you can get your name on that list, it's well worth doing. So there's plenty to do here.

00:29:40[background music]

00:30:05[background music]

00:30:11Sarah Jefferson: Yeah. So you hear it here, first adventurers, come on out and check out Katherine Hot Springs parkrun. Thanks, Salty, for this morning and all that you do for parkrun.

00:30:21Salty - Run Director, Katherine Hot Springs parkrun: Thanks very much for coming out.

Roving report Yvette Turner — Gungahlin parkrun

00:30:24Yvette Turner - roving reporter, Gungahlin parkrun: Hello parkrun adventures it's Yvette Turner here and I am recording from my home parkrun of Gungahlin which is on the grounds of the Ngunnawal people and we were very excited today because Christine and her husband Eman were visiting from Toowoomba and this is the first time that they have done Gungahlin parkrun so what did you think of it?

00:30:43Kristine Vergara - visiting parkrunner, South Toowoomba: Hi Yvette thanks for having me it was good to be able to tic tac with you and Make sure that you were there as well, because I know you've been adventuring. Yeah, we have. We had a lovely time at Gungahlin. So we, well, I especially do love a one-lapper. So it was exciting to be able to do that around the beautiful lake. Eman and I had to do a bit of... swapsies with the kids. So I did venture out first and managed to get my time down to 26 minutes. And then find Eman on the course, walking with Bill. And then we did swapsies and he finished off pretty strong as well. So yeah, we did love it. Shame about the weather. I know.

00:31:24Yvette Turner - roving reporter, Gungahlin parkrun: Our weather today, this is probably one of the worst weather days we have had in a very long time. It was rainy and cold and windy and

00:31:34Kristine Vergara - visiting parkrunner, South Toowoomba: and we thought the rain would hold off but it rained I think the last I don't know 20 minutes so we all got wet yeah but uh we all managed and and it was good but um and uh how what else have you been doing while you've been visiting Canberra uh well we've been celebrating argo's first birthday this week so this was his um birthday parkrun um away from home uh we watched the matildas on Monday and then we also went to the zoo on his birthday so we've had a wonderful week here um and great to the

00:32:06Yvette Turner - roving reporter, Gungahlin parkrun: It's great to catch up with you too. Well, thank you so much. So now I'm going to talk to Ben Clancy. Ben is a Run Director, was a Run Director today at Gungahlin. And Ben actually just recently did his 250th parkrun. I did.

00:32:20Ben Clancy - Run Director, Gungahlin parkrun: Thanks for having me. I was really excited. Did my 250th last week and so happy to get that milestone. And recently I got over my 25 volunteers as well. That's fantastic. Yeah, so good, and Ben what actually got you into parkrun um actually a colleague at work um knew that I liked running and he suggested I come along and yeah it was just one random day I went yes I'll do this and oh gosh I love it so much I've really uh amped it up since about 2018 and yeah just would never go back I've met so many amazing people um gone to amazing places I got

00:32:50[background music]

00:33:02Yvette Turner - roving reporter, Gungahlin parkrun: 40 different um parkruns last year in a row oh fantastic so I've uh I've enjoyed the touristing but also just uh the community feel as well as yeah and I think it's the community and the challenges and actually Christine and I just discovered that we did our 250th on the same day we just found that out yeah congratulations congratulations to the three of us yeah we did Yeah, and Ben, how did you become to be a Run Director? So did you just start off with normal volunteering or did you just jump straight into it?

00:33:33Ben Clancy - Run Director, Gungahlin parkrun: Oh, no, I used to volunteer a bit up in Brisbane with my running team back there. And when I came to Canberra, I just managed to start talking to some of the volunteers down here and got involved and got offered the chance to do it. And I thought, what a great thing. I was actually trying to improve my public speaking skills. So it was such a really good way to kind of enhance those skills and but also give back to the community because You know, it's so great. Everyone does their part in terms of volunteering. You know, we'd love to see more and we keep encouraging more people. But yeah, it's great to lead and just meet new people whilst you're doing that as well. You know, whether it be the runners or other volunteers and yeah, try and inspire some new people to volunteer.

00:34:29Yvette Turner - roving reporter, Gungahlin parkrun: I think it's good. Yeah. I do I think I've done all of the roles except Run Director and I'm always a little bit nervous about it how about you Christine have you run are you no no I'm not so I'm um I I do help in the background um but yeah very active with our South Toowoomba background community as well yeah yeah and it's always fun volunteering and giving back um all right well I think we're out in the we're out actually we've come out of our nice warm cozy cafe um we we for doing this interview for the roving report for the adventurers and we'll catch up at another parkrun again one day sounds good thanks so much bye

00:34:35[crosstalk]

Roving report Tracey Wood — Burrum Heads Beach parkrun

00:35:13Tracey Wood: Good morning, parkrunners. It's Tracey in a Tutu. And I've ventured up the frozen coast of Queensland to Burrum Heads Beach parkrun. Now, Mr. Tutu has lovingly booked us accommodation very close to a parkrun start. However, not the parkrun I was hoping for. This one is about a 30-minute drive from Hervey Bay itself and is in the locality, of course, of Burrum Heads. I believe it's on the lands of the Gurungurung or Buchalaya peoples, but I will need to fact check that. I have arrived here and just seeing the sunrise over the water, fantastic. A couple of native roos around the place, actually quite a few native roos around the place. A few locals out and about. Looks like a fantastic morning. I'm all set up. We're going to have the run briefing soon. Let's see how we go and I'll check back in later. Okay, I have finished Burrum Heads Beach parkrun course and made my way back to the start. I've been scanned and actually received the results already. And now I'm talking with Doug who is our RD and I believe is the Event Director as well.

00:36:31Doug - Run Director and Event Director, Burrum Heads Beach parkrun: I'm the RD as well, yes.

00:36:32Tracey Wood: Excellent. Well, thank you for chatting with me. Tell me how this parkrun came about. What was the force behind it?

00:36:40Doug - Run Director and Event Director, Burrum Heads Beach parkrun: All right. Well, I've been doing parkrun for around 10 years. We lived in Victoria in southeast Melbourne until 12 months ago, January 2023. We've got up here. And in Melbourne, I had probably five or six parkruns within a very short distance from home, which was really convenient. And when we moved up to Burrum Heads, the nearest parkrun was either Hervey Bay or Maryborough or up at Bundaberg. And as nice as those runs are, the travelling was... Yeah, it could be tedious. So I thought, we've got a nice park here, we've got a nice beach here, so let's get a parkrun going at Burrum Heads, which is what I've done.

00:37:28[crosstalk]

00:37:35Yvette Turner - roving reporter, Gungahlin parkrun: Absolutely.

00:37:36Tracey Wood: Now, I have to interrupt and ask, there's a lot of Victorians listening to this podcast and they'll want to know, what was your home parkrun down in Victoria?

00:37:44Doug - Run Director and Event Director, Burrum Heads Beach parkrun: My home parkrun was Berwick Springs.

00:37:47Tracey Wood: Oh, okay.

00:37:48Doug - Run Director and Event Director, Burrum Heads Beach parkrun: Yeah, which is southeast Melbourne in the suburb of Berwick.

00:37:52Tracey Wood: Excellent. Right. Now, also for the listeners out there, can you describe the course, what we saw today, which was absolutely wonderful. And I've just had the absolute pleasure of walking this course this morning. It's a cracker of a day here. But can you describe it for us?

00:38:08Doug - Run Director and Event Director, Burrum Heads Beach parkrun: Okay, well, we have our morning briefings at a gazebo in a kids' park, which is well manicured. Actually, we've had the council out the last week maintaining all the lawns and the garden beds, et cetera. So we have a briefing here. We've got a footpath, which is about... a 200-metre walk down to the sand where we start the run there on the beach. You run 2.4 kilometres on the sand to our turnaround point, which we've got a couple of marshals down there, making sure you don't run all the way into Hervey Bay, and then you run back to where you started on the beach, you turn off the sand, back onto the footpath, and run back up the footpath, back to the gazebo where we had our morning briefings, and that's the finish point there.

00:38:59Tracey Wood: I did get my feet wet a little bit this morning. What happens if it's high tide?

00:39:03Doug - Run Director and Event Director, Burrum Heads Beach parkrun: When I first got this started we had our A course, which is the one that we've just run, and we had an alternate course which ran along a footpath parallel to the beach. So that was the grand plan for the B course, but being moved up here, not realising how much water we get and how much rain we get during summer, the B course gets flooded. So the B course went by the wayside. So I made the decision that if the tide's too high, we don't have an alternate course, so I have to cancel the event. And we started in... February and we've had to cancel four times and I think one of them was to do with a cyclone just the wash up of that it was like a surf beach out there so you couldn't get down onto the sand anyway but otherwise there was about three king ties it was just too high but we've got a clear run at it now until mid December when I have to think about the next time we have to cancel

00:39:49[crosstalk]

00:40:09[crosstalk]

00:40:13Tracey Wood: Okay. Now, what would you like listeners to know about Burrum Heads Beach parkrun? If they were coming here, what would you want to tell them?

00:40:22Doug - Run Director and Event Director, Burrum Heads Beach parkrun: I suppose, first of all, getting here, you've got to make time to get here because we're a little bit out of the way. We're 35, 30 minutes drive from Hervey Bay and there's nothing really around. So you've got to make a trip of it to get up here. Mm-hmm. We've got plenty of parking. There's toilets. We normally have a coffee van here. Mm-hmm. But they're away on holidays at the moment, so if you want your coffee fixed, we do have a coffee van, but just not this week. Mm-hmm. Um, and once you're done here, it's a five minute drive into, into town of Burrum Heads and I'd suggest go down to the boat ramp and have a look there. It's got the river there and, um, it's, it's worth, it's worth a look walking up there, up the beach there, up the Esplanade. Have a look at the boats. It's very nice. And, um, I think there's a nice bakery in there. They do some really good stuff and some nice coffees in there. And we've got the Burrum Tavern and the Burrum Bowls Club. They both do nice meals. Probably not this time of the morning.

00:41:33Tracey Wood: Yep, bakery's always good to know.

00:41:36Doug - Run Director and Event Director, Burrum Heads Beach parkrun: It's worth going in there. But, yeah, certainly it's a nice place and the best part of all it.

00:41:44Tracey Wood: only live 50 metres away yes he's pointing to the right where there's a residential estate there and yes not far away at all look thank you for chatting with me this morning it's been it's absolutely lovely here and uh I totally enjoyed it and thank you very much for your time no problems come again anytime absolutely cheers Okay, this is Tracey in a Tutu signing off from Burrum Heads Beach parkrun. There are other things to note. Do wear shorts or something about knee length just in case there is a bit of a tide. Do not take your shoes off because there's a lot of sand and, sorry, a lot of sand, a lot of seashells and other debris on the beach. There is a caravan park nearby for anyone who wants to travel up here. I've seen roos. I've heard kookaburras. I've seen other wildlife around. Absolutely gorgeous up here. Anyway, I'm off to go do some more touring. Have a lovely weekend, folks. Bye.

00:42:40[background music]

00:42:55Tony O'Connell: And Mel, what an awesome set of roving reports we had there. Sarah, who we heard from earlier in Katherine Hot Springs, she was chatting to Salty, and I'm sure that... Is that a crocodile reference or what? I'm not sure, being in the Northern Territory. But he came up with heaps of tourist advice for the local area. It's actually really interesting to hear about the number of things that you can do in that area around there, sir. Probably one to add to the list, as Sarah suggested. We heard from Yvette Turner in Gungahlin, talking to Kristine Vergara, who was in town for Argo's first birthday. And then she spoke to RD Ben. And then we heard from the lovely Tracey at Burrum Heads parkrun. She was with RD Doug. And how good were those bird noises in the background? The whole roving report was just various birds. I'm sure there's twitchers out there that are sitting there identifying all those bird songs and bird calls. But yeah, another great report.

Dazza's

00:43:54Tony O'Connell: So we're going to move on from our roving reports and we're going to go across to Dazza's. This week, Dazza has said, it's National Trails Day. It's a day to think about just how far off road we sometimes get for parkrun Day. Were you treading the trail today? Maybe grinding the gravel? Or perhaps you pounded the pavement? Whatever was under your feet today, you can put those feet up in Dazza's and tell us all about it. And our listener challenge this week was to incorporate a butterfly into your parkrun.

00:44:24Melissa Ellis: First off, we heard from Lee Cabarita. That's her porn name. And she came to us from South Australia and she said, Hi Dazza, plan C for me today was heading over to Kangaroo Island parkrun, 1500 kilometres from home. But the ferries were cancelled due to poor weather. So I thought I'd go to Victor Harbor parkrun for the V. But that was cancelled due to a damaged pathway. So headed to the gorgeous Goolwa parkrun, was nice and flat course and lovely cool weather I'll celebrate with an iced mocha thanks and Lee shared a photo of herself by the inlet at gua with the event core flute

00:44:59Tony O'Connell: Now, I love to see somebody that has a plan A, B and C ready to go. It's a true adventurer when you know that sometimes things go a little bit pear-shaped. So you've got B and C in your pocket, so you've always covered for your parkrun day. And someone I think that does a fair bit of planning and a fair bit of travelling, we heard from Val Warwick up in Queensland. And Val said, in the state famous for its butterflies, and that was butterfly emojis, And we've seen so many as we've freedomed our way northwards this week. I didn't float like one over the Airlie Beach parkrun course, but I did pound the pavement and squeak the boardwalk as I walked this pitch rest course. My favourite bit was a surprise as the Guard of Honour was given to two reaching unofficial milestones. Steve frees 300th, and congratulations Steve, and another parkrun for 350 prior to the start. We enjoyed brekkie together afterwards. And there was an amazing photo that Val put in showing the Guard of Honour.

00:45:59Melissa Ellis: It was a great photo. And congratulations, Steve, of course, for your arbitrary milestone. And what was I going to say about that? Airlie Beach, the home of the very one and only Tim Oberg. I wonder if Tim was there.

00:46:12Tony O'Connell: And we've got to say congratulations to Tim and his lovely wife, Nikki, on the birth of their child just recently. Have they had number three? They've had number three, so welcome to the world. Oh, congratulations.

00:46:26Melissa Ellis: How lovely. Now, we also heard from Gareth Arnold. He was coming to us from the West Side. He said, it's-a me, Mario. Keep-a the left. Zero butterflies, and there was three butterfly emojis, at Bibra Lake parkrun this morning, but also a complete lack of Koopa Troopas, Piranha Plants and Bowser, as Marshal Mario kept the runners, joggers and walkers safe and on course. Not sure if it was Super Mario, but definitely a Super Marshal. And three clapping hands emojis. And there was a selfie of Gareth and Marshall Mario on course, complete with mushroom.

00:47:02Tony O'Connell: Right out, we're going to go overseas for one mile. We're going to go to the Netherlands. And we heard from Carolyn McRae. Hit the rail, not trail, this morning from Utrecht Central Train to Arnhem Central Train. Then a walk in the rain to Sonsbeek parkrun. May have walked wrong way at first upon exiting the station to arrive just as the runners were heading out to the start line. Rained the whole time so soaked through by the finish just as it stopped and the sun appeared. This course is probably up there as a favourite and put it on your list if you're travelling. After Park Vaff headed back to Utrecht and man were the trains busy. Utrecht was celebrating Pride Day with Make It Loud. Between all the bikes and the thousands of peeps made it slow to explore. And the photo was of Carolyn by the parkrun flag. And she's almost looking like she's standing on top of the pop-up. And we noted that Phil Olson was also there.

00:47:56Melissa Ellis: Yes, adventure is aplenty, as Simon would say. Now... okay who's next Calum Burrell from the UK and he said possibly one of the most trail-tastic parkruns in the northwest of England is Lyme Park parkrun unfortunately not the weather to see butterflies around but it did bring out the lesser spotted Ruth Perkins doing her birthday parkrun well done to Ruth doing her first parkrun in her new age category and loved the cake and there was lots of emojis in there there was two photos One showing Calum, Ruth and Lindsay. There was somebody else in that photo, TOC. I did not know who it was. And the second showing Ruth's amazing 40th birthday cake. It was very bright and sunflowery. Happy birthday, Ruth.

00:48:43Tony O'Connell: Yes, happy birthday, Ruth. And shoot some of that cake over here. I'm always big on my cake. So back to WA and we heard from Rodney Glossop. This morning at Homestead parkrun we were blessed to celebrate one of our locals doing their 500th parkrun. He is very shy and reserved. You could say the opposite to a social butterfly but seemed to enjoy the attention. And there was no photo attached to Rodney's post so come on Rodney lift your photo game.

00:49:12Melissa Ellis: Next, we heard from Karen Hurrell also over in the UK. She said, needed my trail shoes at Talkin' Tarn Country Park, parkrun, where the rain had been heavy overnight and finally caught up with one of the 10 boomerangs from South Beach, which are touring around the parkrun world. No butterflies, but at least the rain held off until I got into the cafe. And Karen shared a photo of herself with the pop-up and the boomerang and showing the lovely green countryside in the background. Research tells us Talkin Tarn Country Park parkrun is in Brampton.

00:49:45Tony O'Connell: Well, we're travelling all around the world this week. Our next one comes to us from Singapore. And we've heard from Alana Tureg, Bedok Reservoir parkrun as a parkrunner. A beautiful sunrise with fan dancers. Saw the butterfly house yesterday at Singapore Zoo and today we'll try to find them at Changi Airport. And there was a butterfly emoji and Alana showed a photo of a beautiful sunrise over the reservoir and hopefully she did find the butterflies at the airport because there's just about everything at Changi Airport.

00:50:18Melissa Ellis: Next, we heard from Eric Banner coming to us from the greater state. And he said, Andrew Johnston hit the trail early to take me to Newborough parkrun, whose course is mostly along the Moe-Yallourn Rail Trail. Martine Barrot didn't join me today as she's taking a rest after regaining her greatsmanship last week. And Eric... is very clever he shared a photo with only Andrew sadface but we were super happy to see Andrew picking up another new Victorian event and we want to send a big shout out and hello and all our love to Martine yes definitely

00:50:52Tony O'Connell: Now, we're going to go to Germany now. Ian Neville, driving rain at Volksgarten in Dusseldorf. And Ivan shared a selfie. Ivan, are you a listener too? Let us know.

00:51:03Melissa Ellis: Yes, because this is the second time we've heard from Ivan. And it was nice to put a face to the name. So thank you, Ivan. I'm going to assume he is a listener.

00:51:12Tony O'Connell: Well, I'm assuming he is, but he missed his butterfly emoji. Well, he did, but maybe... That's our little test, isn't it?

00:51:15[crosstalk]

00:51:19Melissa Ellis: Put it in next week, if you listen, Ivan, and then we'll know.

the Obi Award — Tony O'Connell

00:51:23Tony O'Connell: Mel, we have to come up with an Obi out of all those fantastic photos from this week and comments. Do you have the envelope or do I? I've got a pile of paperwork here and I'm not sure who's got it this week.

00:51:34Melissa Ellis: No, no, I've got it. It's on my desk. It's been pre-prepared by the office staff. Okay, are you ready? This week's Obi goes to... It's Tony O'Connell! for getting himself around the, uh, what was it, Panboola Wetlands, on crutches and we think you're amazing and really silly but you are an inspiration to everybody and I know that wasn't what's in the show notes but we can still use spells photo I press

00:51:35[background music]

00:52:15Tony O'Connell: And that's quite funny, Mel. You've really caught me out there because we had a discussion about this early on about the Obi for the week. Thank you.

00:52:23Yvette Turner - roving reporter, Gungahlin parkrun: You're welcome.

Emails

00:52:24Melissa Ellis: Mel, this week, emails. We had no emails. I know. They were all last week and now we've got none. We should have saved one. Never mind.

Club Corner

00:52:34Melissa Ellis: We'll learn. You'd think we'd learn, but we never do. But so, in absence of emails, let's hear what Reginald's got to tell us.

00:52:35[background music]

00:52:51Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III: This is Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III, with Club Corner, where we talk about the what and why of parkrun clubs, and I am coming to you from Arrernte Country. This time we will try to get through Denmark, Poland and Iceland. Iceland question mark. Yes, Iceland. Amager Fælled parkrun is where Denmark began, back in 2009, and Denmark is the eldest open non-UK country. They are a 9am parkrun country. There are 11 events currently on the books at the time of writing, plus one closed event for the We Were Here, People, Hillerod parkrun. Denmark does have a very cutely named event, Vejen parkrun, which translates as the road parkrun, and they literally run up a gravel road. Overall, Denmark is, by Australian standards, a fits-in-your-pocket country, with all of their events drivable within the time it would take someone from Town Beach parkrun in WA to drive the six hours get to their next closest event. And on the eastern side of Denmark you could continue on for only another 22 kilometres and get to the next parkrun country, Sweden. I wonder how big Denmark is. Fun fact, if you place Denmark over Tasmania, you have loads of landmass spare, just saying. Which is a nice segue to our next country, Poland. Let us start with size, since we just did Denmark. Poland is substantial for a Western European country, and it is the same as Victoria and Tasmania combined, or just smaller than New Zealand and Tasmania combined. Does that help? Poland was parkrun country number 5 to open, back in October 2011, just after Australia and just before Iceland, with parkrun Gdynia. First up, my segue, parkrun Cieszyn crosses the border into Czech Republic, so that is how close they are to their neighbours. Gotta love Europe. It continues to blow the minds of Antipodeans about how close it all is. Poland has a very strong history in parkrun, with more than 100 events active, and they are another 9am star country. And they have another quirky event, with parkrun Zamek W Malborku whose route runs along the walls of their castle. We certainly do not have that in Australia. Finally, let us consider Iceland. They were a short-lived country, not lasting one year. Maybe it was the re-election of Olafur Ragnar Grímsson for a record fifth term as president that did them in... parkrun Elliðaárdalur began in October 2011 and concluded in July of 2012 after 32 events. They hosted 275 participants who completed 550 parkruns, which in kilometres is almost half a lap of Iceland. To place Iceland into size, it has the landmass of North Island of New Zealand. I get the feeling that we had better get familiar with the size of Tasmania as we continue through this series, and perhaps also the ACT. And remember, in parkrun life, all non-Milestone clubs are unofficial and unsupported by parkrun, so stay tuned for our future club corners.

00:55:55Tony O'Connell: Comes in handy, Tassie, doesn't it? It does, and apparently it's not like our Victoria and Denmark comparisons from a little while ago that Danny so accurately picked me up on.

00:56:06Melissa Ellis: We better leave that alone.

Consolidated Club Report

00:56:10Melissa Ellis: But talk. The adventurers Consolidated Club Report for Saturday, the 7th of June, 2025. Of a total of 796 members, we are edging so slowly towards the 800. It really is painful. 556 took part on this day in 12 countries across 293 locations. In the UK, there were adventurers at 50 events. There were 14 in the Netherlands, 12 in South Africa, 4 in Germany and the USA, 2 in Poland and 1 in Ireland, Italy, Lithuania and Singapore. Locally, we had adventurers at 56 events in Queensland. So they took the gold medal. New South Wales and Victoria tied on 46. WA had 17. South Australia had 15. ACT Tassie and the North Island had six. Three-way tie there. Four in the Northern Territory and one on the South Island. Now, there's a little note here. From the office staff saying that as Darwin was cancelled on the 7th of the 6th, that meant that all running parkruns in the Northern Territory had an adventurer added. And that is quite unique.

00:57:22Tony O'Connell: That is the first time that that has occurred, I believe, Mel. Certainly since we've had five parkruns in the Northern Territory, even if only four were running this week.

the Frond — University of Stirling and Amsterdamse Bos (international fronds); Kadina Trail (largest Australian frond)

00:57:32Tony O'Connell: Well, we had an international frond. In fact, we had two international fronds, and we're going to call both of them out. The University of Stirling had four adventurers. The University of Stirling is located in the northern part. I'm going to say it's probably almost up at Scotland, but my geography's obviously not the best, but it's up that direction somewhere. And they were Jason Newell, Darren and Lucille Peelde, and Claire Winsack. And we also had four adventurers Saturday at Amsterdamse Bos, which is located in Amsterdam. We had Danny Norman, Andy and Wendella Poole and Imogen Swales. The aforementioned Imogen.

00:58:12Melissa Ellis: Amsterdam being in the Netherlands, correct?

00:58:15Tony O'Connell: Correct. It is, and it is in fact the capital. No, it's not the capital. The Hague is the capital. It's up a bit from the capital. I don't know. I've never been. Amsterdamse Bos, and I believe from my research a couple of years ago, Bos stands for forest, and it's quite a big forested area in the centre of Amsterdam. And a fun fact, I ran around Amsterdamse Bos with Danny Norman in 2023 in bright sunshine on Saturday when Danny ran it.

00:58:46Melissa Ellis: Oh, memories. Now, the pilgrimage. Oh, this bit's exciting. Wait on, wait on. Three people again, TOC. Annabelle Johnston, Barbara Luther and Renata Koch. Now, Annabelle actually came to Dazza's and she said, hallowed ground under the feet today as lucky enough to make the pilgrimage to Bushy parkrun. Found another couple of adventurers there. Fabulous morning and the rain held off. And there was a photo of Annabelle, Barb, Renata with the bushy pop-up and she's wearing an adventurer's singlet. Now, our office staff tell us that Annabelle finished in 3201 in position 955 and she's from South Australia. Whereas Barb, she finished in 39.42 at position 12.04, and she's from Toowoomba. And Renata, she finished in 50.59 in position 13.05, and Renata is from Sydney. And what else? That is all those ladies' first ever visit in a pilgrimage, okay now the largest front here in Australia was a front of nine at one event and it was Kadina Trail in West Australia and there was rihanna Williams Kevin Murphy Rebecca Simpson ellen raven franz carroll Dave Allmark Louise Minty mckayla Newman and Rosemary knight and I happen to know of somebody else we'll get to that in a minute Now, Andrew Yeatman came to Dazza's and he said, Kadina Trail parkrun for me today, celebrating a mate and fellow parkrun adventurers, Ellen Raven's 500th run. There hasn't been a lot of mention of the old farts lately, so it's great to hear from them. And we would like to wish a very happy 500th parkrun to Ellen. And Andrew shared a photo of the old farts and Ellen. And it even looks like Andrew was RD. So thanks very much, Andrew, for volunteering.

01:00:44Tony O'Connell: And as you read that out, Mel, I was just thinking Andrew's name didn't appear in the front of nine. But of course, as a volunteer, we all know that the parkrun stats don't give us the numbers for volunteers for our Consolidated Club Report. So it's purely the finishers. We'd love to include our volunteers because our volunteers are the bestest ever. But we can't get those stats quite to hand.

01:01:06Melissa Ellis: No, we can't. We do our best to mention you if you come to Dazza's and it is a special occasion. And we do ask that the volunteers give themselves a shout out in the Consolidated Club Report post every week so that, I don't know, we can be aware and say thank you. Anyway, remember everybody, if you want, you can join the Adventurers Club if you haven't already and add us as one of your five affiliations on your parkrun profile. We are so close. Actually, at last look, we were on 797, so three more to 800. I mean, it's all arbitrary, isn't it?

01:01:43[crosstalk]

01:01:43Tony O'Connell: Come on, guys, jump on board. We want to see that round figure, and then we'll chase 900, and then we'll chase 1,000, but let's get to 800.

01:01:50Melissa Ellis: You just worry about your Inverloch lady.

01:01:53Tony O'Connell: Yes, yes, we've already had that discussion, Mel. We had someone from Inverloch run up Bushy this week, who I thought was an adventurer, and she's not. I'm going to have to correct that.

Launches and anniversaries"Where is the cake?"

01:02:06Melissa Ellis: Now, what about the launches this week? Did we have millions and billions?

01:02:10Tony O'Connell: Well, we had two launches again this week, up from the one last week, which is really down on the numbers that we've been averaging. But this week, we had Jenkins Park parkrun in the USA. Houston, Texas gained a third parkrun this weekend with the launch of Jenkins Park. The course will be a loop with two out and back sections on it. It's all on trail and it crosses three bridges. So I'm sure Scotty Trickett would probably want to go to that one if it's got a heap of bridges in it. Week one saw 66 finishes, 22 of whom ran their first ever parkrun, and they were guided along by 10 volunteers.

01:02:48Melissa Ellis: How did I end up with the Welsh one?

01:02:51Tony O'Connell: That's just the order that Park Road Globally actually publishes.

01:02:52[crosstalk]

01:02:54Melissa Ellis: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I can't say that.

01:02:55Tony O'Connell: Someone put them in the show notes and they put Toc Mel, Toc Mel, so I just cut and paste.

01:03:01Melissa Ellis: Okay. Parc Coed Gwilym, north of the Welsh town of Morriston. The course is described as two laps on a tarmac path around playing fields, followed by an outback section along a canal, even a canal towpath, finishing with a further two laps around the playfield. The launch had 201 finishes and 29 volunteers. And that roughly translates, the name that is, Parc Coed, roughly translates into Tree Park.

01:03:30Tony O'Connell: And Mel, you'd be happy to hear that we put Morriston in as the nearest town. I initially put a few of the Welsh towns that were around it in and I thought, nah, that's just cruel. So I changed it just for you.

01:03:42Melissa Ellis: Thank you.

Watching the numbers at Alice Springs Telegraph Station parkrun

01:03:43Melissa Ellis: Okay. In our ongoing segment, we like to call watching the numbers at Alice Springs Telegraph Station parkrun. We had our first adventurer, TOC, today. Adrian Homburg, he even came to Dazza's. He must have been proud. He must have known he was the first one. He said, And I think the butterflies were asleep at 7 a.m. And there was a photo of Adrian with the event core flute showing the finish line in the background. And we used that photo for the consolidated club report. So if you want to have a squeeze at what you're going to be seeing when you head over to that parkrun, go and have a look. Now we've got our information about said parkrun. It was event seven and there were 123 finishes. So that's very similar to last week. They had 121 last week. There was 13 volunteers and 52 first-timers of which 14 it was their first ever parkrun and of course that leaves 36 as visitors. Now, as a special note, the Larapinta Trail is a 231-kilometre multi-day walking track located in the, oh, it's a Tjoritja, Tjoritja, would you say?

01:05:08Tony O'Connell: Yes, that sounds perfect, Mel.

01:05:12Melissa Ellis: slash West MacDonnell Ranges in the Northern Territory. It spans from Alice Springs to Mount Sonder, and the trek typically takes around 12 to 20 days. That's quite a... wide range that's how many days it takes to complete depending on the individual pace and rest stops so I checked adrian's profile and his previous parkrun was Woodlands Historic Park in the greater state back on the 15th of may so it also appears Adrian is a Victorian so we'll take that as a win for the state, TOC

01:05:47Tony O'Connell: Go us.

01:05:48Melissa Ellis: Adrian has completed 227 parkruns at 99 different events, and that includes two in the UK. He's also performed a total of 49 volunteer roles at six locations, and he has a Mally Dex of two, because I looked it up. I'm on point with my research this week. OK, so what we also wanted to tell you is there is also an event at the NMA each year called West Mac Monster. Now, there is different length events during the weekend, but the biggest is the 231 kilometre. And this year there were two first place finishers who ran across the line together, finishing in 43 hours, 31 seconds. No, 43 hours, 31 minutes and nine seconds, which is crazy. And is that not? That's not - so, is that on the Larapinta Trail because

01:06:41Tony O'Connell: I'm not sure, Mel, but that is a massive, massive event to run 231km out through the desert there. One of my friends has run the Larapinta race a couple of times and he puts a lot of photos up. And the actual trail is just full of little boulders and rocks and sand. And to run 231km through that ankle-breaking territory is just, that's mental. Even I'm going to call that one madness.

01:07:09Melissa Ellis: I think this West Mac Monster must be on the Larapinta Trail. But there is also, fun fact, it is the Finke Desert Race weekend in Alice this weekend. Now, the Finke Desert Race is an off-road, multi-terrain, two-day race for motorbikes, cars, buggies, and quad bikes through desert country from Alice Springs to the small and remote community of Apatula. Apatula, called and Aputula was called Finke until the 1980s, and it's in the Northern Territory. Now Finke, as it's commonly known, is one of the biggest annual sporting events in the northern territory bikes go first and buggies and cars follow a few hours later they drive from Alice to Aputula on the Sunday and return on the Monday if they have successfully completed leg one I don't know what that means. Anyway, last year, Alice local David Walsh became the first rider to win the bike section five events in a row from 2019 to 2024, with 2020 being cancelled due to COVID. Of course, everything was cancelled that year, toby price has also won six events but just not in a row so that's what makes old mate David special now toby and David are pretty well known names in this sport locals and visitors can camp along the 229 kilometre track and watch the race geez they'd have a lot of space wouldn't they it's so much fun apparently but there is also viewing at the start-finish line just outside of Alice, if camping isn't your thing and you prefer to stay in Alice well why wouldn't you because you can do a parkrun there now

01:08:46Tony O'Connell: Mel, just a couple of little things on that one. The reference to being able to do leg two if you complete leg one is I believe the event has a fairly high dropout rate because it's pretty hard on bikes and cars and people. So you have to finish leg one to actually participate in leg two. And the Western Max Monster is a race that, as you said, is along the Larapinta Trail. It has a number of different event lengths. And the race lengths are 231km, 128km, 65km, 25km and 5km. And curiously, all of those races sold out except for the 231km. So there must be a few people going up there for Western Max Monster.

01:09:28Melissa Ellis: Goodness me, all the stats. And you know what? I did not write that. So I just read it for the very first time then. And I do apologise if I made a mess of it. But I tried to sound enthusiastic, Toc. I hope you appreciate that.

parkrun adventure challengelistener challenge

01:09:41Tony O'Connell: Righty-o, Mel. We've got to come up with a listener challenge. And I've been having a bit of a look. And next Saturday, it's got two... Well, there's actually a huge number of days like there is every day now. But it's International Bath Day. And I reckon it's been pretty wet around the country. I reckon it's time to get creative with some emojis. You know, think Jemima Puddle Duck. Think all sorts of things. And let's see what the listeners can come up with.

01:10:10Melissa Ellis: I hope people aren't just having a bath once a year.

01:10:13Tony O'Connell: Oh, I'd hope not.

01:10:15Melissa Ellis: International bath day. I might take a peg for my nose. Okay. Well, okay. Good idea. Let's have lots of bubbles and rubber ducks and all sorts of things. That could be fun. Even those West Coast people can go for their dips in their ocean, in their nice warm ocean. Oh, we shouldn't say it like that. We're not bitter at all.

01:10:38Tony O'Connell: That's it. Nice warm skies. No, it's only eight degrees outside and pouring rain and hail.

01:10:46Melissa Ellis: Yeah. All right. I didn't even talk about my letterbox. Can I tell you about my letterbox? It's up. That was my project this week. But guess what? Paint doesn't dry very well in the rain, Tony. It does not. And guess what? No more gaps falls out in the rain, Tony.

01:11:03Tony O'Connell: But that was your long weekend challenge. So well done, Mel.

01:11:06Melissa Ellis: It's very straight. It's very straight and centred, which is good. Yes. And when it dries out, we'll paint it again.

01:11:15Tony O'Connell: Well done.

Sign-off

01:11:15Melissa Ellis: Thank you.

01:11:16Tony O'Connell: Mel, we're going to talk about next parkrun day. What's the Mel plans for next parkrun day?

01:11:22Melissa Ellis: I need some sort of acronym or thing for my weekend, don't I? Like Mel's plans. Can't be Mel's plans. That sounds like I'm plagiarising Sam's plans. Oh, but I'm not. Anyway, I'm going back to South Australia, TOC. I'm heading west again and I'm going to drag Dave with me this time and we're going to head over to The Avenues and we're going to stay a couple of nights in Hahndorf. So I'm actually not even doing an overnighter and I'm actually even going to have accommodation for a change. So that'll be a change.

01:11:56Tony O'Connell: Refresh my memory. Is the avenues the one out in the state forest where they have the bonfire going at the finish line?

01:12:01Melissa Ellis: I think so.

01:12:02Tony O'Connell: yes that one looks so cool it's a it's a I think it's really hilly sorry Dave you'll be right no I've seen some pictures that they they I think at one stage actually had a volunteer to get the fire going and keep the fire going so yeah that'll be good that that would probably get you another volunteer because you know I'm going to be wearing all the layers again

01:12:27Melissa Ellis: What about you, Toc? Where are you headed?

01:12:30Tony O'Connell: I'm going to go to the first anniversary of the Great Southern Rail Trail, Korumburra. It's one that we launched a year ago and it's going great guns over there. They've gone through a couple of little minor course tweaks at the moment. They're doing a big development in the rail yard where it starts and finishes. And it's also a cheeky Wilson number 53 for me. So, yeah, just ticking off another little box on the Wilson Index.

01:12:55Melissa Ellis: Hey, Toc. Hashtag DFYM. Don't forget your mushrooms.

01:13:03Tony O'Connell: No, that's more lean gaffer.

01:13:06Melissa Ellis: Oh, there's been reference to Korumburra.

01:13:08Tony O'Connell: There has been, yes. Apparently Korumburra is a good place to go and collect your mushrooms. Just don't dry them in Korumburra.

01:13:16Melissa Ellis: But don't eat them. Don't eat them. Be really careful. We do not, in this podcast, does not contain eating foraged mushrooms. Okay, so we have to have a bit of a chat about this. I've got a confession. Sorry, everybody. There is no pod next week. I'm having another week off. I'm so sorry.

01:13:33Tony O'Connell: That sounds perfectly fine, Mel. Good opportunity for everyone to refresh. Yeah, the week after. Who's back in the hot seat the week after that?

01:13:42Melissa Ellis: Oh, I don't know. I can't remember. Probably me and you. It'll be me and you.

01:13:47Tony O'Connell: That's a long way away. Let's see what happens.

01:13:49Melissa Ellis: Okay. All right. Thanks for joining me again, Toc. It was great to catch up. As always, I'm glad you didn't get your leg amputated.

01:13:57Tony O'Connell: No, they took an arm off instead, but that's just a surgery mistake.

01:14:03Melissa Ellis: As always, everybody, you can contact us via the parkrun adventurers on Facebook or our email, which is parkrunadventurers at gmail.com. That's it for another week, and we'll see you all next week. No, we won't. We'll see you in two weeks for more adventures. It's Saturday morning.

01:14:58Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III: It's free, it's free, it's free.